Saint Louis beats Kailua, 59-41, to take Surfriders' tourney

Saint Louis's Kevin Marks puts up a shot against Kailua. Greg Yamamoto | SL

KAILUA - Kevin Marks and Colten Nascimento combined for 23 points to help Saint Louis beat Kailua, 59-41, for the championship of the Surfriders Holiday Classic Saturday night at Kailua High's gym.

Marks scored eight of his team-high 12 points in the second half, when he also had three steals. Nascimento added 11 points, all of which came in the first half. Ihaka Johnson, who scored seven, was named the tournament's MVP.

Kailua's Christian Scheer led all scorers with 15 points.

"We looked OK," Saint Louis sixth-year coach Keith Spencer said. "We played sloppy tonight, but a lot had to do with the intensity that Kailua gave us. The senior class that we have, we can pull it together."

Hand checks were called consistently as the teams combined for 44 fouls (24 by Saint Louis). Three players fouled out: Nascimento for Saint Louis, and Hano Kohatsu and Christian Mejia for Kailua.

The difference was Saint Louis took advantage of the calls, knocking down 14 of 23 free throw tries. Kailua was a dismal 14 of 30.

"It's early in the season," Kailua coach Wally Marciel said. "Same thing happened to us last year at the free-throw line. We work on it at practice, but gotta get our guys in basketball shape. We have a lot of football guys on our team and that's the difference. It's a turnover when you can't hit a free throw. We hit our free throws, we're in this game tonight."

Saint Louis stormed out to a 12-0 lead with 3:19 in the first quarter before Kailua finally got on the board at 3:07 on a basket by Mejia that ignited a modest 7-0 run by the Surfriders.

Kailua, 6 of 16 in free throws in the first half, eventually watched Saint Louis take a double-digit lead midway through the second quarter en route to a 32-21 lead at the break.

Marks scored Saint Louis' first six points of the second half, but also drew his fourth foul with 2:28 left in the third quarter.

"Kevin is a very athletic kid," Spencer said of Marks. "He's one of our senior kids who is going to lead us this year."

But Kailua could never cut its deficit to within single digits because of their ineffectiveness at the free throw line and foul trouble by Hano Kohatsu and Mejia, both of whom are 6 feet, 3 inches tall. Each had three fouls in the first half.

"That changed the game also," Marciel said. "The new rule on hand-checking in the post and the extended hand; if they're going to call everything all night, we're going to be here three, four hours. They pick and choose what they call, so there's nothing you can do about that. We have to adjust to how we play and stay out of foul trouble."

Though it's still early in the preseason, the tournament title is something the Crusaders (3-0) can build on following their 2-9 record last season.

"It's a good morale booster for this team," Marks said.

"It was a good tournament," Johnson added. "It was kind of tough, but challenging for us to get ready for the ILH season."

Reach Stacy Kaneshiro at [email protected].